In a letter to the Sunday Times, the consultants said: "We are dismayed at the decision on the rationing of drugs for patients with advanced kidney cancer."

The draft guidance rejects the drugs, saying they are not cost effective for patients with advanced and/or metastatic kidney cancer.

The medicines do not cure the cancer but extend a person's life.

But the professors wrote: "We have already seen distraught patients remortgaging their houses and selling cars simply to buy drugs freely available to those using health services in countries of comparable wealth."